What does my dress sense got to do with anything?

Clothes make the man – or the woman, apparently, as the saying goes. With every new dispensation of anyone or anything, any new office, any new appointment, there is usually a list of top three things that are scrutinised. Not whether they can do their job – not whether they have a great track record – but more so, who are they wearing and how do we feel about it?

In the past few weeks since the swearing in of the new president, I’ve heard more than I care to about who wore what to the inauguration, how they looked, if they need a stylist, and how their children decided to show up. It’s a trend in Kenyan – well, I suppose you can call it journalism, but also a trend in pop culture that there will always be an inspection of clothes. Almost like we are still in high school, and the prefect has to check if your socks are rolled up correctly.

It's a trend internationally, too. Hillary Clinton’s signature style was the iconic pantsuit; Michelle wore her homegrown Target fashion-sense like armour, and camouflage, against those who thought she was both too lofty, and too accessible. 

But there’s a whole different message, I think, behind why we obsess about clothes, and what we think that means – completely different from why people wear the clothes in the first place. Clinton, for example, was often touted as trying to be too masculine, too domineering, hence the pantsuit. In reality, on a state visit where she was wearing a dress and a photographer caught an odd angle and photoshopped the lewdness onto billboards, she stopped wearing dresses altogether. The clothes are not always who the woman is.

Then there’s the age-old question, ‘how did she let him leave the house like that?’ This is in reference to a married man dress-sense, and its assumed the woman should take part in making her husband look proper. 

This is interesting to me for many reasons, the main one being the assumption that all men listen to their wives and will only leave their houses to go somewhere public after a thorough inspection – again, like a prefect. Women have been consistently blamed for holes in socks, tired-looking shirts, ill-fitting suits, and everything else that has nothing to do with them. Do people think politicians are children and politicians’ wives are their ayahs? Does the same rule apply conversely – can the first husband of whichever county be blamed for a gear sitting wrong, or a fascinator that went out of style last season?

We still think clothes – the outward appearance, generally – mean you look good and can thus do a good job. We judge people who do not fit our standards harshly – harshly enough that we don’t think it’s possible for them to do what they need to do in office. When in reality, this kind of thinking should have been left behind generations ago, when we as artists proved that a tie does not make a CEO, and a well-ironed pleat will not guarantee that someone will not steal from the coffers. If we know this for sure, why do we take so long to allow the work to speak for itself?

It's the same fight from time immemorial. If a TV anchor has dreadlocks on live television, will the nation take her seriously? Does a miniskirt mean you’re of loose morals? Will the fact that a man knows how to manipulate a cravat mean that he won’t cheat on her? The answers are – if they choose to. Of course not. And definitely not.

When I think about how I choose to present, I think about a dear friend’s mother who used to often say to me that she would buy me a comb, if the problem was money. I would laugh and dodge the offer because I knew I would never comb my hair, and she would still read my articles. Congratulations on getting to the end of this one!